Monday, February 26, 2007

Porky at the Crocadero

1938's "Porky at the Crocadero" is a true overlooked classic directed by Frank Tashlin. It's too bad it didn't make it onto the recent Tashlin-themed Golden Collection disc (it would have been an ideal short for the amazing Daniel Goldmark to do a commentary track on). It is a great looking cartoon that parodies popular bandleaders and music of the era. It is fast-paced and has a great soundtrack.

It is still enjoyable even if you don't get all the jokes, but I still thought I'd give a brief rundown of some of them:

The Crocadero is spoofing the Trocadero, popular nightclub in Los Angeles at the time.

5 comments:

For the faster pace that WB cartoons were taking by 1938, Tashlin's decision to finally slim down Porky for this cartoon works better for the animation, even if he's still not in synch with the Clampett-Jones design. And Tash still gets to say goodbye to "fat Porky" in the Paul Whtemann impersonation scene (a gag that wouldn't have worked at all if Frank had kept using his earlier pig design).

It's certainly one of the coolest looking black and white cartoons Tashlin (or anyone else) did for Warner Bros. Look at the range of darks, lights and mid-tones. This one gets all the mileage out of black and white it can get, and then some.